Historic initiative goes to City Council

HENRI BRICKEY

Staff Writer

MURRIETA -- All the required signatures on a petition to
preserve a piece of land in Old Town for a museum have been
verified by the county Registrar of Voters, giving the initiative
the final approval needed to go before the City Council next
week.

City Clerk Kay Vinson said Wednesday that the Registrar of
Voters reported on Aug. 28 that the required number of signatures
had been verified.

"They (Registrar of Voters) looked at 3,114 signatures and found
2,351 good ones," Vinson said.

The petition, which calls for the rezoning of roughly 10 acres
of land for future use as a historic museum and park, will go to
the City Council on Tuesday.

Ayleen Gibbo, chairwoman of the nonprofit group Citizens for
Historic Murrieta, initiated the petition and will be at Tuesday's
council meeting to speak in favor of its approval.

If approved by the City Council next week, the initiative would
halt a housing development from being built in the area bordered by
New Clay, Second, Kalmia and B streets. Gibbo wants the city to buy
the property and put a historic museum at the site where the ruins
of a historic grade school still stand.

The property in question contains remnants of the first school
ever built in the city and was the site of a train station. The
developer, Pacific Communities, is planning to build 35 homes on
the land.

"To me, to have a tract of homes go in at that historic site is
totally disrespectful to the history of this city and the pioneers
who made it," Gibbo said Wednesday.

Gibbo would like to see the old school stay as is and also wants
to add exhibits to show what the school once looked like. The
school was built in 1885, then torn down and rebuilt as a larger
school in 1920. Then in 1956, the school was deemed unsafe and
closed. The district sold the building to an antique dealer in
1972. A fire destroyed much of the building in 1984.

Gibbo, who is running for a seat on the Murrieta City Council,
began circulating the petition in February, and the city clerk
stated that there were 3,169 signatures on the petition last month.
The petition needed at least 2,210 signatures, or 10 percent of the
city's registered voters to qualify.

Now that the proper number of signatures have been verified by
the Registrar of Voters, City Council members will have several
options in dealing with the initiative. They can either approve the
initiative, request a feasibility report on the plan or request a
special election, in which case a majority vote of 50 percent plus
one would then be needed to pass it.

If the council requests a special election, it would likely
occur during next March's primary election, Gibbo said.

If a feasibility report is requested, the report would have to
be presented to the council within 30 days.

But Gibbo is hoping that the council will approve the initiative
next week.

"If there's no funding for the park or museum … the city needs
to at least approve a change in the property's zoning and purchase
the land so we don't lose that piece of property forever," Gibbo
said.

Councilman Brian Youens says he supports what the initiative is
trying to achieve but frowns on the tactics Gibbo is using to
accomplish that goal.

"Personally, I support the acquisition of that property and
saving a historic site for future generations, yet I don't agree
with the initiative process that forces the city's hand," Youens
said.